Essays on trans, intersex, cis and other persons and topics from a trans perspective.......All human life is here.

This site is the most comprehensive on the web devoted to trans history and biography. Well over 1400 persons worthy of note, both famous and obscure, are discussed in detail, and many more are mentioned in passing.)

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28 January 2014

After a journalism degree at the University of Minnesota and a stint in India for the Peace Corps, by 1968 Robert Sylvester was the editor of a small-town Minnesota newspaper, which led to meeting Mae, the women who became his wife. He told her that he was a transvestite, and later that he felt that he was a transsexual.

In 1970 he consulted a psychiatrist was told told that quitting was like quitting smoking. So he purged his female wardrobe, and Bob and Mae were married. Bob became a city councilor in St Paul, Minnesota, and then president of the council. Later he worked in investment banking.

In 1977 he told a female therapist that he wanted to be a girl, and she said: "Well, then, why don't you get on with it?" Susan started going out as female, and in January 1980 she committed to the gender change. Bob and Mae divorced in 1981. On 1 January 1983, Susan and Mae held a ceremony for invited friends including the mayor, to "commemorate the departure of Bob Sylvester and arrival of Susan Kimberly". Transition was completed in 1984 courtesy of Dr Biber.

After a few years of unemployment, she was back in City Hall working for the mayor. She ran unsuccessfully for City Council and County Board. In 1998 Susan was appointed deputy mayor of St Paul under Norm Coleman, they both having switched their allegiance to the Republican Party.

"I lost more friends becoming a Republican than I did becoming a woman".

She also worked for Coleman when he was elected as a US Senator after Democratic incumbent Paul Wellstone, the most prominent senator to vote against congressional authorization for US invasion of Iraq, died in a plane crash (perhaps assassination) eleven days before the election.

Later Susan was vice president of economic development for the St Paul Chamber of Commerce. In 2007 she flew to Florida to speak on behalf of Susan Stanton who was being fired from her job as city manager after announcing a coming transition.

25 January 2014

Harry Gorman was an athletic heavily-built man who worked as a cook for the New York Central Railway. He drank liquors, smoked strong cigars, frequented saloons and dance houses most nights.

In 1903 he broke a limb and was hospitalized in Buffalo. There he was discovered to have female genitals. A clergyman came and pestered him that a 'relapse towards female apparel and demeanor' would be appropriate. Gorman refused to grant the gentleman any more interviews.

He did mention that he knew at least 10 other men who had the same condition as himself and who worked for the same railway company.

22 January 2014

Robert Percy Kelly was born in Workington, Cumbria, a twin and one of seven children. His mother was Scottish and his father a Manx carpenter. He was drawing by the age of two. He grew up a keen footballer (he played for Workington Town FC), cyclist and hiker.

In 1932 he won a national handwriting competition organized by the Royal Mail. His first job was as a Post Office telegraph boy. He bought paints with his first pay packet. He then moved to Kendal as a telegraph officer, where he joined the Kendal Art Society.

During the war he served first with the Royal Border Regiment, but then transferred to the Royal Corp of Signals when his talent for drawing was recognized. He was assigned to GHQ in Whitehall, where he sat next to Winston Churchill during an air-raid. Churchill admired his draughtsmanship and suggested a visit to the National Gallery. He had never been to an art gallery before, and the visits to the National Gallery did leave a mark on his paintings. Three of his watercolours were accepted for a forces exhibition at the National Gallery and he was presented to King George VI on its opening.

"Drawing is as natural as walking, A piece of charcoal or chalk is like an extension of my forefinger."

He later served in France. He married for the first time in 1942. After the war Percy and his wife Audrey ran the Post Office in Great Broughton, Cumbria, where he had an easel set up behind the counter. He managed to exhibit at the Royal Academy and the Royal Society of Arts. Percy and Audrey had one son, Brian. In the 1950s Percy suffered several nervous breakdowns, and in 1958 relinquished the position of sub-postmaster. Supported by Audrey, Percy in his 40s studied art at Carlisle College from 1961-5.

At the end of the 1960s he seemed to be on the cusp of fame. He was admired by royalty and written up in the The Guardian. At age 48, he was exhibited in Workington, London and Kings Lynn. But he couldn't co-operate with dealers, and especially he could not bring himself to sell his work.

"I cannot paint for monetary gain. I would rather starve than sell one piece of my work but I know when I depart this world people will stop and wonder at the beauty and truth that I have portrayed."

Audrey came home to find her husband dressed in her clothes, which confirmed her disappointment that he had not turned out to be a football-playing breadwinner. They divorced in in 1970.

The next year Percy married Christine, a mother of three and the now ex-wife of his eye specialist. This was a scandal, and they fled to St Davids, Pembrokeshire, where Kelly attempted to come out as a cross-dresser, but this was not well received. His paintings changed also: more colour, lighter, more flowers. In the early 1980s they moved to Rockland St Peter, Norfolk. Christine finally ran out of patience and left in 1983. A private exhibition of Kelly’s paintings was arranged the next year specifically to pay the alimony.

In 1985 Kelly changed her name by deed poll to Roberta Penelope. She continued to live in the house in Rockland St Peter which became increasingly cluttered both with Kelly's paintings and various junk that she scavenged. By this time Roberta was dressed as female almost all the time.

During her last few years she sent lavishly illustrated letters to her few friends, which are now considered an important part of her oeuvre. Her paintings for the first time included a human figure, usually Roberta herself.

"I cannot stand the male species. I find them quite pitiful. They have brought me so much misery."

She did start taking female hormones, but never considered the operation. Apart from the cost, she thought it superfluous.

"I now feel I am a woman first and not the other way around."

Roberta died aged 75.

She died intestate, and her estranged son Brian inherited by default. The paintings in his house were sold in five sell-out exhibitions in Cockermouth, Cumbria. Brian died during the fifth, aged 47. Other collections of Kelly's work were discovered stashed with friends and forgotten. She had been afraid of losing his supplementary benefit.

20 January 2014

Hans Crystal performed at the 82 Club in the 1960s and is regarded as one of the great drag performers of that era.

Her departure by surgery was announced in a 1965 issue of Female Mimics, after which she presumably changed her name (Hans not being unisex), and was not heard of again, except that she had a a small part in the 1967 film, She-Man.

17 January 2014

Sinclaire was raised an Irish Catholic in South London. When aged seven Sinclaire saw father almost murdered when he was pushed over a balcony. Nikki completed transition in 1991 with surgery on the NHS. She had medical complications and was bedridden for a year afterwards.

However she then completed an LLB at the University of Kent at Canterbury. Nikki worked for Lloyds of London, as a supermarket manager and in Cyprus with tourists.

In 1999 she was raped while walking home. While it had been established in R V, John Matthews that the rape of a trans woman was legally recognized, this was not widely known and the rape of Nikki was classified as assault. The experience reinforced Nikki's existing inclination to identify as lesbian.

In 2004 she wrote to The Pink Paper coming out as lesbian, but declined to lead a LGBT group within UKIP.

In the 2005 UK election she was the UKIP candidate for Halesowen and Rowley Regis, in the west Midlands. She turned up at a Queer Question Time, where representatives of only the three biggest parties had been invited, as an open lesbian and UKIP candidate, but was arrested when she refused to leave.

In 2006 Nikki met a woman and they have been in a relationship since.

In 2008 Nikki met ex-Prime Minister Thatcher who told her to "never give up" (which became the title of her autobiography). She also campaigned in California for US Representative Susan Davisand Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In the 2009 European Elections, Sinclaire, the UKIP candidate was elected a Member of the European Parliament to represent the five million people in the West Midlands. Later that year, when UKIP leader Nigel Farage temporarily stood down, she entered the leadership election and came third.

In 2010 Sinclaire resigned from the right-wing Europe of Freedom and Democracy grouping in the European Parliament, of which UKIP is the UK component. She was also having increasing problems with leader Nigel Farage. For this she lost the UKIP whip. Nikki submitted a complaint to the Exeter Employment Tribunal that UKIP had discriminated against her on the basis of sexual orientation, and cited that fellow MEP Godfrey Bloom had called her a queer. UKIP failed to offer a defence at the Tribunal and she won by default.

She sat as an independent, and then as the only member of the We Demand a Referendum party. She campaigned vigorously for a UK referendum on leaving the European Union, and after collecting a petition with 100,000 signatures was able to secure a debate in the UK Parliament. She has also campaigned against high-speed rail and against Roma encampments.

Delivering the petition to 10 Downing St

In early 2012 Sinclaire and three others were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud the European Parliament via allowances and expenses. She remains out on bail.

In the US 2012 elections Nikki campaigned for Democrat Tim Kaine to become a Senator and for Barack Obama for President.

In November 2013 Nikki published her autobiography in which she discussed her gender change, partially because others had threatened to out her.

UKIP is of course a right wing political party which has been thriving as ex-members of the Conservative Party have joined in protest against the Conservative Party having introduced gay marriage. While there have been other LGBT members in UKIP their position is not easy. See more, more. I have not found any statement by Sinclaire re why trans voters should support either UKIP or herself as an independent.

15 January 2014

Ginza Rose (who took her name from the popular shopping area in Tokyo) worked as a show dancer for the US occupation forces in the 1950s.

She wished to marry her boy friend, and gender surgery was arranged in 1962 so that this could happen.

However her husband was officially entered in the family register as her adopted younger brother.

This was prior to Carrousel Maki's first surgery, and the 1965 prosecution of a surgeon who had removed male sex organs. The trial led to a 1969 ruling that made transgender surgery illegal: a situation that would continue until 1998.

Ginza Rose's name in private life is not known, nor was she heard of again after her transition.

11 January 2014

Kim was raised in the Bronx, New York. By age 14 he was going out in semi-drag. He took up with the young Billy Schumacher (later to become International Chrysis). They were photographed fooling around outside the Astor in Manhattan when Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton were staying there, and the picture appeared in a Life Magazine article on teenage delinquents.

The photograph in Life Magazine: Kim with back to camera, Chrysis at front

Kim and Chrysis each left home and shared a tiny apartment in the area that later became New York's SoHo. They met sex magazine pioneer and editor of Exotique magazine, Lenny Burtman who arranged photo-shoots and other favors. Kim had a boyfriend who worked with her to soften her Bronx accent. She got to know New York female impersonators such as Tammy Novak, and performed at Club 82 as a stripper and as a showgirl. Her song was the theme music from A Man and a Woman. She toured North America as a female impersonator.

Kim and Chrysis had uncredited roles in the chorus line in the 1967 contest that became the film, The Queen. In 1968 a photograph of Kim and Chrysis appeared in Female Mimics. By 1969 Kim was being kept by an oil tycoon.

Kim with her mother

She also starting doing photography for Eros Publishing Company, which published Eros, ModeAvantgarde, Hooker and Exposé. When Female Mimics was relaunched in 1973, the first issue featured Kim winning a Los Angeles beauty contest. In 1979 Kim became editor of Female Mimics,which was owned by Jennifer Jordan, one of Lenny Burtman's ex-wives, and the name was changed to International Female Mimics. The transsexual content was increased and eventually explicit photographs were introduced. Kim also became editor of Exotique, a revival of Burtman's pioneering fetish magazine from the 1950s.

Also in 1979 Kim was in Los Angeles doing a photo-shoot when he discovered Sulka in the audience. The next year he put her in the film Dream Lovers, and then after her surgery, in The Transformation of Sulka, 1981, and Sulka's Wedding, 1983. He became a major producer of she-male and fetish porn – spanning 8mm, VHS and DVD. He also made straight porn.

In FMI, 11,1, 1980

++Kim had reverted to male as Ken Olsen. He met and married a woman. Their marriage has lasted: they now have grandchildren.

In 1998 Kim/Ken won an award as Best Fetish Producer. The same year he edited the original run of Exotique in book form. In 2001 he edited The Christy Report, a historical survey of sex and fetish images. He was inducted into Adult Video News (AVN) Hall Of Fame in 2004, the first transgender person to be so.

“I am married to my wife. I am with her. Something I learned from all my years working with clients all over the world: Men and women can both be very fluid in their sexuality. Plus things like certain sexual scenarios can engage a person deeply for a time. Sometimes it’s same-sex activity. Some people stay attracted to one gender or another all their lives. I was with men — when I lived as a woman — who never would have called themselves gay, but they were not unhappy about my extra parts at all. Like I said, back then we did not name things so much. I never thought of any of the things I did as who I was. They were things I liked. Things I did.”

*Not the horse exhibitor. Not Ken Olsen the sound engineer.

James Mills. "The Detective: a good cop fights for law but the deck is stacked against him". Life, 3 Dec 1965: 90d-132. http://bit.ly/1cJ6A0B.

"These are the twins - Kim and Bobbie". Final section in George Alpert. The Queens. New York: Da Capo Press, 1975.

The Internet Adult Film Database (IAFD) entry on Kim is a bit dubious. See Jim Beaux’ comments. The image supposedly of Kim is actually of Carnal Candy in a 1984 film. It lists Kim’s years active as performer: 1984-2001 – except that Kim never performed in any adult films.

Ms Bob wrote a 3-part history of Female Mimics for TG Forum. Bob lists Kim as appearing in the magazine, but says nothing at all about Kim becoming the editor.

I couldn’t find any photographs of Kim after the early 1970s.

In the Advocate article, Kim says that her aunt and then her mother recognized her in the Life Magazine photograph. As she has her back turned, how could they be sure?

09 January 2014

Cassar, a hairdresser resident in Cospicua, Malta, achieved transgender surgery in January 2005. In June 2006 she successfully applied under Article 257A of the Maltese Civil Code and her sex and name were changed on her birth certificate.

Subsequently Joanne and her boyfriend, T. applied for a marriage licence. However they were refused in that the Marriage Act prohibited unions between persons of the same gender.

Joanne sued and in February 2007, a Justice noted that the proposed union did not contravene any provision of the Marriage Act. He upheld her request and ordered the director of Public Registry to issue the marriage banns. The marriage registry appealed. In May 2008, another Justice observed that Maltese Law offered no legal definition of either gender, but took into account an affidavit by the former chairman of the parliamentary bio-ethics committee, Dr Michael Axiak, who wrote: "after gender reassignment therapy, a person will have remained of the same sex as before the operation".

In 2010 Joanne was assaulted and had her bag stolen as she left the
dance floor at a carnival party. She was frequently insulted and
pushed around by strangers.

Joanne then opened a case in the First Hall of the Civil Court in its constitutional jurisdiction, claiming a breach of human rights. She won in April 2011, but then lost on appeal a month later.

Joanne, at some financial cost filed a case against Malta in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. The then Attorney General filed submissions arguing that the reassigned gender on Cassar's State-issued identity card was intended only to "spare her embarrassment", and was not meant to entitle Cassar to legal privileges associated with the female gender.

The new government then relinquished the case in the European Court and presented amendments to the Civil Code under which transgender people re now considered as individuals of the acquired sex with full rights, including the right to marry. Furthermore Joanna Cassar was awarded compensation and also honoured by being accepted into the Xirka Ġieħ ir-Repubblika Society which is limited to 20 members.

07 January 2014

Born 4th in a family of 8 children, in Mabvuku, 17 km east of Harare, Naomi was considered feminine by most people in the town.

She was active in Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ) (more) where she fought unsuccessfully to be accepted in the women's programs. Three times in her life, when she was down after being shunned, she attempted suicide.

Naomi’s big success was in facilitating the one and only grant, of ZW$95,000, to GALZ from the National Aids Levy.

04 January 2014

After being evaluated at the Vilnius Psychiatric Hospital and the Vilnius University Santariškės Hospital in 1997, L. (1978 – ), who lives in Klaipėda, took testosterone, had his breasts removed and has been in a stable relationship with a woman. He also adopted a Slavic name to avoid the gender-specificity of Lithuanian names. However he was constantly being embarrassed in that the prefix on his official documents identified him as a woman. Furthermore, his doctors refused him more operations until he is legally a man.

In 2003 the new Lithuanian Civil Code came into effect of which Article 2.27 § 1 provides that “an unmarried adult has the right to gender reassignment in a medical way, if that is medically possible”. The paragraph of the provision said: “the conditions and procedure for gender reassignment shall be established by law”. However the said conditions and procedures never came to pass.

In 2006 L was able to take his case to the European Court of Human Rights, where it was ruled in 2007 that Lithuania must adopt the subsidiary legislation to its Civil Code on gender-reassignment of transsexuals, within three months of the present judgement becoming final, or L would be awarded €40,000. He was also awarded €5,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage.

Lithuania did not adopt any relevant subsidiary legislation, and in July 2008 paid the €40,000.

Subsequently, in 2009 and 2013, parliamentarians have proposed to eliminate Article 2.27 § 1 from the civil code, in effect banning all gender changes.

02 January 2014

Purnell was conceived in a haystack in the Wirral during an air-raid. He was sexually and physically abused at prep school by the headmaster who was later convicted. His parents had a 'messy horrid' divorce when he was doing his O-level examinations.

He felt confused in that he felt that he should be a girl but was not attracted to men. He developed an alternate identity as Anne who, by the age of 15, socialized only with people who knew nothing of Purnell's male life.

Purnell did a degree in chemistry. He found love with a woman to whom he explained about Anne. She accepted this side of him, but asked that Anne change her name as her sister was also Anne. Purnell had been called Dormouse at school, and, in homage to Lewis Carroll, became Alice.

They were living in Sussex. One evening on the way home from work as a research chemist, Purnell encountered, before the police arrived, a trans girl who had hanged herself in a tree. Her father showed up and expressed anger but not sorrow. Purnell felt that he could easily have been that trans girl, and this led to becoming a volunteer with the Samaritans, the advice line for those at risk of suicide. She found that a third of calls on the line featured gender difficulties.

Alice did not know how to express her femininity until she found a a copy of Virginia Prince's Transvestia in a sex-book shop in London's Soho. She used the Transvestia contact system to find like-minded persons, and became a member of the European Chapter of Virginia Prince's FPE.

Alice, Alga Campbell from Dublin, Giselle, a US expatriate, and Sylvia Carter, met in 1965 and agreed to found the Beaumont Society (named after the 18th century transvestite pioneer). The membership numbering was started at 100 (which was assigned to Alice, and then issued back and forth from that to give the impression of greater membership. Initially there were almost as many overseas members as in the UK, with some in Malaysia, Kenya and other parts of the Commonwealth. Alice became the overseas contact person because of her French. Regional contacts were appointed but were often the only member in their region.

After an initial meeting in Hampstead, the first full meeting was held in Southampton in 1966 with 12 in attendance including two wives.

Purnell had been attending the Charing Cross Hospital Gender Clinic under the care of Dr Randell, and that same year was offered surgery. However Purnell married his lover instead after five years together. They had two daughters and a son.

Following the practice of Prince in the US, new members had to be vetted, and the application form explicitly stated that no hint of overt gayness would be tolerated.

"It was also risky meeting others to sponsor them. I remember a character from Gibraltar who was very cagey indeed, who I arranged via the contact system to sponsor so she could attend meetings when in the UK; (you could not do so if not sponsored as they were often in people's homes). At the meeting in a car park this person told me my date & place of birth, schools and University, bank balance and workplace. I was horrified. He had discovered all this via our Secret Service for whom he worked in the Colony. He said he did this to secure his own confidentiality in case we breached his. I felt disinclined to sponsor him and was really horrified that even then governments held so much info' on all of us. I did sponsor him after discussion with Alga. It was a bit of a mutual standoff, but what an invasion of my own privacy!"

Alice, Alga, Virginia, Sylvia - 1971

In 1969 Virginia Prince visited the Beaumont Society in London, Leicester and Scotland. On her return in 1971 she stayed with Alice. Alice was on BBC Radio 4 with agony aunt Claire Raynor. She attended the TV/TS conferences at Leeds University in 1974, and Leicester University in 1975 – the latter was organized by the Beaumont Society. Also in 1975, Alice was a co-founder of the Beaumont Trust, a registered charity, which separately from the Beaumont Society, set up a helpline and published educational booklets on transgender topics. In 1976 Alice became Vice-President of the Beaumont Society, and President a year later.

In 1977, Alice trained as a nurse, specializing in geriatric services. She then worked as such for 26 years, at one time becoming a matron, ++including nursing support for transgender surgery.

She ++finally had surgery in 1982 after the dissolution of her marriage, and remained President of the Beaumont Society until 1984. She also worked with Judy Cousins at SHAFT. She researched the then literature on trans topics and was disappointed. She joined HBIGDA (now WPATH) and attended its European meetings. She found that they were dominated by US concerns and that the Standards of Care were mainly to protect the surgeons, and that the emphasis was on psychiatry rather than on psychology/counselling. Using the contacts that she had made she organized the first of the GENDYS conferences which was held at Manchester University in 1990. This was intended as a British conference, and deliberately brought together each type of professional who deals with trans persons, and each type of trans person. There were a further seven GENDYS conferences held every two years. Alice edited all the GENDYS Conference Reports and often contributed papers.

Alice in 2011

After obtaining a masters degree in counselling and psychology, she co-founded Gender Trust and subsidized it in its first year. It was intended to help transgender rather than transvestite persons, and was, like the Beaumont Trust, a registered charity. However after a year the legal counsel to the Gender Trust was insisting that the trustees were to view her counselling notes. She regarded this potential breach of confidentiality re those she had counselled to be outrageous and resigned from Gender Trust. She also took them to court to establish that the copyright to the 2005 book was hers, and was not held by the Trust. ++She estimates that she has counselled around 500 trans persons.

She is also a poet, a dog lover and a fossil collector. She has lived most of her life in Sussex.

Alice Purnell was made an OBE in the 2012 New Years Honours List: "For services to Transgender People".

We have a list of the 4 founders of the Beaumont Society, but we still don't have a list of the 12 founders of the Hose and Heel Club.

Alice says that the Beaumont Society was never really anti-gay, merely obliged to distance itself from being perceived as gay because of the laws at the time. Whether you buy this or regard it as a post-facto PR position, the Beaumont Society has grown away from its Princian origins. The interview with Christine Burns contains none of the mean spirited rhetoric that Prince herself retained till the end.

Note that Alice uses 'transgender' as a umbrella term apart from transvestites. You find the same usage with Katherine Cummings, the Australian FPE alumna. The sterile debate re transgender=heterosexual transvestite is mainly a US hangup.

++In the initial verion of this article I had assumed that Alice was non-op because a) she was president of a Princian organization and b) there was no statment to the contrary. However it has now been clarified that the assumption was not so, and statements have been added in the narrative above.

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About Zagria

I have a social science degree. I spent several years in the 70s doing Gay Lib counselling, and moved on to organizing trans groups. I was rejected by the Clarke Institute (now CAMH) in the mid 1980s, probably because I do not match either of their stereotypes, but was accepted by Russel Reid on our first meeting in late 1987, and had surgery from James Dalrymple some months later. I have mainly worked as an IT consultant. I have been with the same husband for 45 years.